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I've got hold of a few from Dark Sphere in the UK but not made too much use of them yet. I did have a bash with the black (Black Lotus) over a zenithal undercoat. Suffered from the same issue a lot of the black 'speedpaint' types seem to in that it had a distinctly green tinge to it. Less prevalent once it dried but still a factor.

 legionaires wrote:
I heard today that there's a big chunk of the year Vallejo is making stuff like auto and house paint. Is it going to be the case that if you don't manage to get a first wave of Xpress you are going to be waiting 9 months? I know my local Hobby Town's Vallejo rack has been empty for months.

Vallejo does make Fine Art and Craft paints, but not house or auto paints AFAIK. You can see a brief history of Vallejo at https://acrylicosvallejo.com/en/vallejo-history/

After the comments here was not sure about if that video was worth my time but gave it a shot... lasted 2 minutes

I mean let's compare! "This ink feels weird I dont like it!"

And that was suppose to be informative? Great! YouTuber finds it weird and doesn't like it

Bye now.

I bought the whole set for my Birthday.

I'm happy with them. Most of the colours are really nice, the main weak point I think is the Browns. Which GW does a lot better. My favourites are in the Blues, Purples, and Greens.

I love the turquoise and emerald colours. Not quite sure what to use them on though. They don't fit my usual historical colours.

 NAVARRO wrote:
After the comments here was not sure about if that video was worth my time but gave it a shot... lasted 2 minutes

I mean let's compare! "This ink feels weird I dont like it!"

And that was suppose to be informative? Great! YouTuber finds it weird and doesn't like it

Bye now.

I normally like Broadsword, but that was the most unhelpful review/summary/whatever I've seen on the topic Why did they compare Baal Red to AP Blood Red then complain about the lack of contrast in Baal Red when Baal Red is one of the new high coverage paints, it's Blood Angels Red or Flesh Tearers Red that are made to do what AP Blood Red does. Same with Imperial Fists Yellow vs Zealot Yellow.

I guess it goes back to a discussion we had on the new GW Contrasts where they probably should have labelled the new paints something else other than "Contrast", it was clearly enough to confuse YouTubers

 Ghaz wrote:
A video by Broadsword Wargaming comparing the Xpress Color, Contrast, Speed Paints and Dipping Inks.

Just been watching that and came to this thread afterwards.

Broadsword seems to have completely different experiences of Dipping Inks from Stahly.
Stahly recommended them on what he found of them, I bought the full set of 36 and they arrived this week.
There is a sizable discount from GreenStuffWorld at the moment and UK stock. Coast me £117 all in, which is very good for 36 large bottles.

Anyway now I am in a little bit of a panic because, at least from what Broadsword has showcased, most of them appear to be crap.

If you have them all, have you tried them before panicking?

Yeah, the GSW stuff looks wildly inconsistent, based on those. Not entirely surprised given their method of promoting it using renders instead of actual painted examples...


The Vallejo samples she showed look overall nice and consistent, and the couple of colours lacking a little in contrast (specifically the red and yellow) can be easily fixed with zenithal priming, so that's promising.

Hey, Orlanth, here's a photo of a terrain piece I did with 3 GSW colors on it:



The fencing is Papyrus, the tree is Skeleton Brown and the grass is Ork Flesh. I also have a few other pictures if you're interested.

-Vilegrimm

Edit: I used Gray Seer spray primer for the basecoat, if that helps.

I have all of the GSW dipping inks, and they've been fine for me - but I'm probably not your typcial use case as I mainly use them over colours or mixed with things like Contrast to get various effects. I don't use the "official" method except for rarely.

I also haven't yet used all of them.

 JohnnyHell wrote:
If you have them all, have you tried them before panicking?

No, but I am not at that stage yet. Currently I am assembling. Test miniatures for my new army (Skaven) will come soon.

I tend to research everything before I buy anything.

 insaniak wrote:
Yeah, the GSW stuff looks wildly inconsistent, based on those. Not entirely surprised given their method of promoting it using renders instead of actual painted examples...

Thank you, my point exactly.

 Vilegrimm wrote:
Hey, Orlanth, here's a photo of a terrain piece I did with 3 GSW colors on it:



The fencing is Papyrus, the tree is Skeleton Brown and the grass is Ork Flesh. I also have a few other pictures if you're interested.

-Vilegrimm

Edit: I used Gray Seer spray primer for the basecoat, if that helps.

Thank you for your input.

 Azazelx wrote:
I have all of the GSW dipping inks, and they've been fine for me - but I'm probably not your typcial use case as I mainly use them over colours or mixed with things like Contrast to get various effects. I don't use the "official" method except for rarely.

I also haven't yet used all of them.

This highlights, indirectly my main problem with these products.

Since I moved on from (only) regular Citadel paints I have been mired by the underlying understanding of the inconsistency of paints both between and in brands.. I cant just look at a pot and say this goes on like this. With the contrast family I have to know before I use it is a colour is saturated or unsaturated, mixes well, is transluscent, reactivates, etc etc. It is a lot of information. In fact it is information overload.

Hence my panic. I do not ever think my purchase was a waste of money. I am sure that good use can be made from Dipping Inks, as Vilegrimm kindly demonstrated. But I haven't a clue which brown to put on which part of which rat. I could experiment, but how many combos do I need to test to gain The Knowledge, and is that knowledge transferable. Knowing how to paint fur is different from armour, or spears, or belts and so on and so forth.
I could test on sprue but that doesn't work in all applications, so I will have to test on rats, and unlike my Warlord, I do not have rats to waste

Been testing the xpress paints to base paint some mechs I've printed lately and so far I'm decently happy with them. This is one:





All xpress paints except for the black of the head, sword and circle thingies on the legs and torso (speed paint Grim Black) and the green cubes (Original recipe Citadel Technical Hexwraith Flame)

Cool tutorial by Angel Giraldez, mostly using Xpress C.

 Orlanth wrote:

Hence my panic. I do not ever think my purchase was a waste of money. I am sure that good use can be made from Dipping Inks, as Vilegrimm kindly demonstrated. But I haven't a clue which brown to put on which part of which rat. I could experiment, but how many combos do I need to test to gain The Knowledge, and is that knowledge transferable. Knowing how to paint fur is different from armour, or spears, or belts and so on and so forth.
I could test on sprue but that doesn't work in all applications, so I will have to test on rats, and unlike my Warlord, I do not have rats to waste

Unless the rats are supposed to be clones, some variation in colouration and tones would be natural within a group. On that basis, I'd say the rats are perfect test subjects.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Modock wrote:
Cool tutorial by Angel Giraldez, mostly using Xpress C.

Damn. I do hate that green. Like, fine it other people like that skin tone but it ain't for me.

 Azazelx wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:

Hence my panic. I do not ever think my purchase was a waste of money. I am sure that good use can be made from Dipping Inks, as Vilegrimm kindly demonstrated. But I haven't a clue which brown to put on which part of which rat. I could experiment, but how many combos do I need to test to gain The Knowledge, and is that knowledge transferable. Knowing how to paint fur is different from armour, or spears, or belts and so on and so forth.
I could test on sprue but that doesn't work in all applications, so I will have to test on rats, and unlike my Warlord, I do not have rats to waste

Unless the rats are supposed to be clones, some variation in colouration and tones would be natural within a group. On that basis, I'd say the rats are perfect test subjects.

Trouble is I am not talking about the shade, but transluscence and a lot of other factors.
I am all for some variation within the pack between rats, but that is not what contrast gives, you get ranges from pastel to not-inkwash through to saturated flat colour.
Prior to this I could guess what effect a paint had by looking at the pot. Now that is no longer so.

Also I mentioned fur to start, but different paints in the contrast family and similar products have different effects. A pastel rat is essentially an illusion or ghost rat. I could do an entire army in a pastel style and benefit from the 'artistic' licence, this is not the effect I am looking for but it would be valid. I absolutely dont want the effect between units, within a unit or on different parts of the same model.

I have left over rat bits on sprue on spare bases, I will tast as far as I can on this before committing select paints for select purposes. I have a painting log, I document everything, mostly so I can add units later or repair models sometimes years after I do a faction. So I know what to do, I must test all the browns and flesh tones, record everything and then move onto other colours and purposes. I am just putting off the chore because essentially I will need to do a log for every paint combo I might need for the army. which might run to seventy plus colours total.

I've been painting for a long time. I've used Contrasts since they were released. I know some are more or less translucent than others.

If somthing is too translucent for your requirements, then give it a second coat of the same or a different version of the colour once it dries. It's not Speedpaint so you don't need to worry aboutit reactivating.

Or, you know, write three paragraphs about why it's too hard/frustrating to give a rat model a second coat & log that info about the paint's behaviour..

Juan Hidalgo using Xpress Color for Slapchop!

The best part of that video - 05:1,05

 Ghaz wrote:
Juan Hidalgo using Xpress Color for Slapchop!

"You don't want to dilute xpress with water too much or it'll turn into a wash."

Well now I'm confused as to what xpress is supposed to be.

 Vermis wrote:
Well now I'm confused as to what xpress is supposed to be.

I think the idea is that you can use those undiluted paints like glazes over some foundation to quickly create depth either over a flat colour or over an underpainting (quickly pre-shaded base tones for a whole area like shown in the video). But if you highly dilute it for whatever reason (want less intensity or work in multiple less drastic layers) like in the example (1 part paint to 3 parts medium/water) you want to use medium instead of water because water (due to surface tension) should rob a colour of any of its "doesn't pool as much in recesses" properties at that ratio.

I wouldn't call any of these Contrast-type paints washes exactly. Traditionally washes are used over paint to shade recesses, but these paints apply a lot of pigment to flat and raised areas.

So yeah, makes sense to me that if you thin them down they'll lose coverage and mostly just shade recesses. I've used thinned Contrast paints in more or less this way over regular paints. But undiluted or less diluted they can BE your basecoat.

I’m just looking forward to their supply actually starting… I ordered a full set from Wayland at the start of January, and no news yet.

Xpress Colors over metallics

Juan uses the Xpress Colors on medium size vehicles (e.g., a Sentinel) using the slapchop technique.

Even slapchop might test my patience for army painting, but yeah, I may have to make my first hobby splurge in a long time, a long time...

Ghaz wrote:Xpress Colors over metallics

I like that. Hard to tell on my screen, but it looks like only the brown and red of the colours used, dulled the metals?

 Vermis wrote:
Even slapchop might test my patience for army painting, but yeah, I may have to make my first hobby splurge in a long time, a long time...

Ghaz wrote:Xpress Colors over metallics

Spoiler:

I like that. Hard to tell on my screen, but it looks like only the brown and red of the colours used, dulled the metals?

Most likely all of the metals were dulled to some extent since the Xpress Colors, like most of the Vallejo Game and Model paints, are matte. He did go back and drybrush some of his pieces with silver which might have changed how you're perceiving them.

It looks like some of the Xpress Color paints may be showing up for our neighbors to the north in Canada as Universal Distribution seems to have the new Game Color paints available, while Bunker 45 and Stevens International have the Xpress Colors listed as available.

In the US they're still listed as a pre-order on ACD Distribution and we would need someone with an account with Alliance Games to see if they have them yet.

Warhipster did a live test of Xpress colors yesterday. I am increasingly impressed and intrigued.

 Ghaz wrote:
It looks like some of the Xpress Color paints may be showing up for our neighbors to the north in Canada as Universal Distribution seems to have the new Game Color paints available, while Bunker 45 and Stevens International have the Xpress Colors listed as available.

In the US they're still listed as a pre-order on ACD Distribution and we would need someone with an account with Alliance Games to see if they have them yet.

I have managed to pick up a few colors up here in Canada from Tistaminis, as well as seeing them at a few other game stores. Still waiting on the bulk of them from Universal Distribution (I have them on preorder from a local shop).

So far I'm liking the limited colors I have. The Omega Blue and Velvet Red are very nice, and the Martian Orange is a nice color after 2 coats. Of course, this is over the slap-chop drybrush, so the orange may stand out better over a pure white coat.

-Vilegrimm

 Ghaz wrote:
In the US they're still listed as a pre-order on ACD Distribution and we would need someone with an account with Alliance Games to see if they have them yet.

Miniature Market has a few of the Xpress colors in stock, as well as all the new Game Color line.